


Deep Like a Graveyard

by masterwords



Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: Aaron Hotchner Whump, Drugs, Hurt Aaron Hotchner, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Mind Control, Murder, Post-Episode: s10e21 Mr. Scratch, Protective David Rossi, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-19
Updated: 2021-01-19
Packaged: 2021-03-17 05:29:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,413
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28843863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/masterwords/pseuds/masterwords
Summary: “I thought I’d find you here,” came a familiar voice from beside him and Aaron looked up into the one face he’d been desperate to see since leaving Dr. Regan’s house.  Dave sat in the seat across from him and folded his hands on the table top.  He looked soft, misty, ethereal in the fluorescent glow.   It was easy to let Dave sit, easy to look at him with his beautiful olive skin and his dark eyes and the smile that could make him see stars.  He’d come here to be alone, but this was good too.“I thought JJ drove you home,” Dave said softly, leaning forward. Aaron nodded, gulped, tried to find his voice.   It wouldn’t come. Yes, JJ had driven him home, with her gun ready in case anything happened.  Yes, she’d driven him home after disarming him entirely, and though she thought he was overreacting, she was ready in case he tried to hurt her.  He couldn’t trust himself.  ”
Relationships: Aaron Hotchner/David Rossi
Comments: 6
Kudos: 46





	Deep Like a Graveyard

**Author's Note:**

> I have three WIPs post-Scratch, this was the easiest to push through from start to finish because it’s the simplest, the one that assumes the least amount of damage done, and the only one that might leave you feeling a little hopeful. We all need hope on Mondays, I think.

It wasn’t uncommon to see a man sitting alone in this diner at 2:16am. In fact, it was too common. The only woman bold enough to enter was the waitress, no one knew her name anymore, who had been haunting the greasy little establishment since the 1970s and had the cruel features and wide smile to prove it. The stories she’d heard from these creatures of the night would chill you to the bone, but they poured them out all over the place as she dumped bitter coffee into their mugs. If these walls could talk, she liked to say. Maybe they did, maybe that’s why no one else dared come in at night, no one who didn’t come with a story of their own to offer as a gift. When the tall, thin man with the messy dark hair and the blood on his cheek entered, she didn’t even blink. He looked like all of the others, put together like they were a part of the daytime world with his white shirt and his tie, but somehow crumpled and messy, frayed at the edges so the night could seep in. He moved like he was made of mist, the kind you found swirling through the alleys, warning you not to enter lest you find yourself with no way back out. She gestured for him to take a seat anywhere he liked and she grabbed a clean mug from the stack with a carafe of the good stuff, the hot and fresh stuff, not the sludge she’d been serving the others. He looked like he needed a little extra care. He looked fragile, that was unusual for the creatures she was used to. She could see it in his eyes, he was on the brink, but she knew her coffee could nurse him back. The good stuff. 

“Can I get you a slice of pie, doll?” she asked, pulling the mug from his table and watching a small spider scuttle away quickly. She’d caught it there earlier, decided to let it stay underneath, no one ever sat at this booth anyway. Not even in the daylight. Any number of mugs would have something living trapped underneath, some of the regulars liked to think they could guess which ones and how many legs it might have – the trouble was, they were almost always right. And they’d drink their coffee from the mugs anyway, but this one, she didn’t want that for him, he didn’t belong there. She wanted him to offer his stories and go, never return. So she gave him a clean one, and poured the hot coffee with a smile. He looked up at her with haunted eyes, gleaming under the fluorescent light, brimming with tears. She’d almost forgotten what it could feel like for her heart to break until just then. Truthfully, it was the first reminder she still had a heart beating beneath her breasts in a long, long time. 

“Banana cream,” he whispered, and she smiled, knowing she’d judged him correctly. The creatures she knew always ordered cherry or maybe pecan, the banana cream was reserved for the breakfast crowd with the children – only children liked bananas in their dessert around these parts. He looked like someone who needed extra whipped cream on top. He looked like someone who needed a hug. She could provide the whipped cream, and hope that someone else might come along with the rest. 

“You got it,” she said, offering him a smile. He didn’t return it. She hadn’t expected it, but she imagined it was a lovely smile, the kind that made you get goosebumps. The kind that changed his whole face. Didn’t look like the sort that used it often. 

Aaron sat, folded in on himself, taking up as little space as he could in the oversize booth with its mint green vinyl and red table top. The colors hurt his eyes. The lights hurt his head. His body didn’t feel right, didn’t feel like his own. He was sore, his hands trembled. The neon lights from the bar across the street cast an odd filmy glow on his table and he blinked, realizing that the tears had fallen from his eyes, splashed in pools on the table. 

“I thought I’d find you here,” came a familiar voice from beside him and Aaron looked up into the one face he’d been desperate to see since leaving Dr. Regan’s house. Dave sat in the seat across from him and folded his hands on the table top. He looked soft, misty, ethereal in the fluorescent glow. It was easy to let Dave sit, easy to look at him with his beautiful olive skin and his dark eyes and the smile that could make him see stars. He’d come here to be alone, but this was good too. 

“I thought JJ drove you home,” Dave said softly, leaning forward. Aaron nodded, gulped, tried to find his voice. It wouldn’t come. Yes, JJ had driven him home, with her gun ready in case anything happened. Yes, she’d driven him home after disarming him entirely, and though she thought he was overreacting, she was ready in case he tried to hurt her. He couldn’t trust himself. He’d told her to do all of it, begged her to pat him down, take all of his weapons in a fleeting moment of clarity. And then he’d slept, the entire way back he slept with his head against the cool glass of the SUV, knowing her gun was trained on him somewhere in that vehicle. He was sure she wasn’t scared of him, but he was scared of himself. He’d tried to make her scared of him to protect her. “Are you ready to talk?”

“I already,” he muttered, and Dave nodded. 

“I know. But we both know there’s more.” Aaron shook his head. He didn’t know if there was more, he couldn’t remember what he’d already said. Everything was blurry, faded around the edges, like someone smeared Vaseline on the camera lens before shooting the film. When he tried to conjure up images all he saw was blood, heard shots and JJ’s voice ringing out clear over everything. Her voice had chilled him to the bone, he remembered that. He started to talk, tried to make it make sense again. Was it the same as he’d told it before? He couldn’t remember the before. He remembered sitting in the back of the ambulance, refusing to let them tend to his injuries, Dave’s voice, and then JJ was driving him back. But he tried, he tried to make it make sense. He started with Dr. Regan, watching her take her own life, an image he was sure wouldn’t ever leave him as long as he lived – he saw it every time he blinked. She didn’t even hesitate, she looked glad to do it.

“My eyes burn,” he muttered, and watched Dave eat his sandwich. When had he ordered a sandwich? And where as his pie? He shook his head, rubbed at his eyes, continued. The story was out of order he knew, but the details were coming in places he’d struggled with before – the way Lewis seemed afraid of him, the sick smile, the warmth of Morgan’s blood on his face. He didn’t know which details were real or imagined but they were easy now. Dave just sat and ate his sandwich, never said a word. Aaron reached down, cupped his mug in his hands and pulled it to his lips, sipping the bitter mud-colored liquid. He blinked, and in an instant he saw the waitress put his slice of pie down before him and Dave was gone. Plate, sandwich, person, all gone. 

“Who you talking to, sweetheart?” she asked, dropping a fork beside his plate. He scowled. 

“Not sure,” he said softly, raking his hands down his face desperately. His head was throbbing, he felt the sticky blood on his fingertips. She just smiled and refilled his coffee. He didn’t scare her, he seemed harmless, just lost. She noticed the bloody fingerprint on his mug before she walked away, thinking that it wasn’t the first time she’d seen one of her mugs bloodied. At least she was certain it was his own blood and not someone else’s, there had been times she wasn’t sure. 

He heard the bells chime on the door, and felt someone walk toward him. He smelled the cologne, the warm pipe tobacco and clove scent, and he heard the waitress call to him to sit anywhere. The chosen place was beside Aaron, hip to hip, and it was only a moment before Aaron could feel an arm snaking around his shoulders, pulling him close. Dave. Again, but not again, for the first time. He didn’t move, just closed his eyes and grounded himself in the solid feeling of the man beside him. The other Dave hadn’t ever touched him, he couldn’t smell him, he was paper thin and made of mist now, he could see it this time. This Dave was warm and soft, his fingers gripped Aaron’s shoulder tight, almost painfully so, like he was afraid the other man would disappear. 

“I’ve been looking everywhere for you,” the real Dave said softly, and Aaron nodded. Tears fell, burned their salty tracks down his cheeks, landed in his lap in tiny crystalline puddles. “Jessica called and said she heard JJ’s car in the driveway, but no one ever came inside. She was worried.” Aaron nodded. He could piece together the rest. Maybe Dave had just started casing the nearby areas, anything in walking distance, or maybe he’d asked Garcia to track his phone. It didn’t matter, he was there now. 

“My head…” Aaron muttered, and Dave nodded. Reid had already given him a rundown of what to expect, side effects, how long it would take the drug to wear off. He understood it all, it would just be a matter of helping Aaron through it. He pressed a kiss to Aaron’s head and sighed. He could remember a time not so long ago that it had been him, drugged and seeing things that weren’t really there, feeling things that made his skin crawl to think about now. He’d nearly shot Derek, he could remember it like it was yesterday but it felt like a memory that belonged to someone else, planted there but not his own. 

“Eat your pie,” Dave said softly, sliding the plate closer to Aaron. He dipped his finger into the pile of whipped cream on top and licked it, smiling. “It’ll help.” With trembling hands, Aaron reached out, picked up his mug, and took a gulp of coffee. Dave was still there when he finished, and some of the fog lifted. The waitress came by and spoke to Dave, and he was sure it was real this time. Dave paid the check, tipped her better than she’d ever been tipped in her life, and helped Aaron eat the pie. The diner was giving him the creeps, he wanted to get out of there, into the fresh air of the deserted streets. He didn’t belong there, the walls didn’t want his stories. 

The street lamps pooled yellow on the sidewalk, and Aaron thought he saw Peter Lewis leaping from shadow to shadow, keeping pace with them. His veins pumped ice. He shivered. They didn’t say a word, this Dave never asked him to talk, he’d already heard what there was to hear. They passed foggy, deserted alleys that looked to Aaron like corridors to shadow worlds. Dave’s arm was around his waist, fingers hooked protectively in his belt loops. Walking through the streets at this time of night was ill advised, but neither of them seemed at all worried about what was lurking around them. The windows were all dark, neon signs buzzed and fizzled around them, Aaron felt them crackle against his skin – he was electric. 

They ended up at Dave’s car, and that in turn brought them to Dave’s home. Aaron hadn’t protested, he didn’t have the will. His head was pounding mercilessly and his eyes were on fire. The guest room was made up for him already with a pitcher of water and a glass at the bed side, his own pajamas laid out before him. He’d slept in this guest room once, years ago, but these days his place was in the master bedroom with Dave. Not tonight though. Tonight he’d lurk here, in these shadows, behind a locked door. Dave promised to lock his own door, too, without even having to be asked. Unlike JJ, Dave knew he couldn’t be trusted and wasn’t afraid of offending him. Dave had never walked on eggshells around him like the others, he’d never bothered worrying about Aaron’s feelings much. Somehow it brought Aaron comfort, vindication, proof that his fears were valid. He was susceptible for up to three days, depending on the strength of the mixture used, according to Reid. Dave kissed him on the cheek, like usual, and closed the door behind him, waiting to hear the lock click into place before he went to his own room and did the same. Dave slept with his gun on his nightstand. 

Aaron didn’t sleep, just tossed and turned, crying as quietly as he could into his pillows. Every time he closed his eyes, Dr. Regan took her life and then he was covered in Morgan’s blood. He watched the life fade from Morgan’s eyes, and then it started again. JJ’s voice echoed through his mind. It was relentless. He paced the room, stalking from corner to corner. Tried to watch TV but the infomercials were making him angry, these people with their fake smiles and their inane comments. He bet none of them would ever have to question their grip on reality, they took it for granted with their useless plastic gadgets and their nice, neat studio sets. He tasted the bile rising in his throat but he didn’t throw up, just felt like it was right there, settled in, threatening. The water was warm by the time he drank it, but it soothed him. 

When the sun broke through the blinds, piercing the darkness of his room, he picked up his phone and dialed Morgan’s number. It was all he could think to do to calm his nerves. It was selfish, calling this early, he knew it. He’d ask forgiveness later. 

“Morgan,” came the groggy voice on the other end, and Aaron felt a sob escape his throat immediately. He couldn’t hold it in. “Hotch?”

“Sorry,” Aaron muttered, blinking the hot tears of relief away. “I just…needed…” Morgan nodded, he understood. Dave had told him what Aaron had seen, he’d told all of them on the drive back. It gave him the creeps. 

“Hey, I’m good, man,” Morgan said in his gentlest voice, and Hotch sucked in a deep breath. “We’re all good.”

“Sorry to wake you,” Aaron said, and hung up the phone, easing back down into the bed and squeezing his eyes shut. There it was again, the same sight, the real death and the fake one, mingled together, forever tied to one another in his mind. He almost picked up the phone, almost dialed and started it over. The rest of them had been shot in his vision, too, but not like Morgan. He hadn’t seen them, he’d heard, he’d known it, but he saw Morgan, he felt the blood, that one was real. He lay in his bed all day, clinging to the shreds of sanity that were slowly stitching themselves back together. Dave had gone to work, like the rest of the team, and he was alone in the house. His phone rang every hour or so, someone checking up on him, and Dave dropped by on his lunch hour with food and his kind eyes and his gentle words. As the day progressed, reality seemed to become easier, more solid. The shadows receded. His head ached, and by the time Dave came back after work it was the last remnant of the night prior. It wouldn’t let up. 

Morgan called him while Dave prepared dinner. “You good, man?” he asked, and Aaron nodded. 

“Better,” was his reply. “Thanks.” They had nothing else to say, ended the call quickly, but when Aaron thought he could feel the blood on his face again he could pull out his phone and see that Morgan had called him this time. That was real. Morgan was alive, they all were. It got easier to remember that, even when the events from the night before were scattered and faded. 

He slept that night. He dreamed, but this time it was of the diner. The waitress. She was telling him stories and pouring him coffee. The garish reds and greens still hurt his eyes, but the banana cream pie soothed him. He poked at the whipped cream with his fork, dug around until he found a banana slice and ate it happily. It reminded him of his grandmother and he told the waitress a story about one Sunday morning when she’d sliced up bananas and put them on top of a bowl of vanilla ice cream for he and Sean to eat for breakfast. She’d said that’s what grandmas are for, didn’t they know that? They weren’t bound by the rules of moms and dads anymore. And then, in his dream, he was there, seated at her table, eating a bowl of ice cream. Sean was a child, and she looked the same as ever, but he could feel that he was grown and no one seemed to pay it any mind. 

“You’re always so serious,” she said to him, ruffling his hair. “It wouldn’t kill you to smile.” He tried, but he was returned to the diner, and then to Dr. Regan’s house and there was the blood again. He woke in a panic but reality settled over him like a blanket – he was in Dave’s guest room, his team were alive, Dave was sleeping right down the hall. It was getting better. 

On the third night, he woke up but it wasn’t because of a nightmare, it was because he was cold. He padded to the kitchen and made himself a cup of tea, wrapped in a blanket. Dave came to him, rubbing the sleep from his eyes, and wrapped him in a hug. It was the first real hug in days, not one filled with fear or apprehension, not one of comfort, just a hug between people who loved each other.

“Come to bed,” Dave said, and without fear, Aaron accepted. He finished his tea and rinsed the mug, then he let Dave lead him down the hall to his room, to his bed. Aaron curled up beside him, put his cold hands inside of Dave’s shirt, used the other man’s warmth selfishly, and he slept. He didn’t dream about Morgan or the diner. 

When he returned to work, sure he could trust his own mind again, his head was still throbbing. It hadn’t eased up in days and nothing he took seemed to touch it. Reid assured him it was just the drugs working their way through his system but there was some part of him that worried it was permanent. He was sitting over the case file on his desk, Dr. Regan’s face staring up at him. He heard a soft knock at his door, and there was Morgan. Impossibly tall, very alive, holding a file box in his arms. Aaron smiled. Couldn’t help it. Wished he hadn’t, but couldn’t have stopped it if he’d tried. 

“Damn,” Morgan said softly, sauntering into the office. “Never thought I’d see the day when you looked happy to see me. I should die more often.” 

“What can I do for you, Morgan?” Aaron asked, trying to wipe the smile from his face but he couldn’t seem to. He could, however, roll his eyes at his friend’s ego. That was easy. 

“Just wanted to stop in and say good morning. Glad to have you back.” He dropped the box on Aaron’s desk with a wink, and Aaron understood – every time he was out, Morgan got saddled with the most unpleasant parts of leadership and he was all too happy to give it back as quickly as he could manage. 

Unfortunately, that box of cases and reports was very, very real. There was no question in his mind.


End file.
